A little-noticed surge across the U.S.-Mexico border: Americans heading south | Hacker News Reader

A little-noticed surge across the U.S.-Mexico border: Americans heading south

washingtonpost.com

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I work for a tiny (remote work) startup that isn't funded so the pay is minimal for now. I lived in San Diego for most of my life but I couldn't really afford it anymore without giving up on the startup.

So I moved to Playas de Tijuana. The rent is hundreds of dollars less than the apartment that I had in the ghetto on the US side, but it's right on the beach.

I haven't owned a car for awhile so take Uber most of the time when it's too far to walk. Short Uber trips would cost about $6 in the US, and longer ones $23 or so. In Tijuana it is $2 for short or $7 for longer. Some things like many electronics seem to be similar prices to the US side, but other things like food are significantly less than the US. Normally to get groceries I walk to Calimax or Walmart. The private health insurance with medication was adding up to quite a bit and I did not want to lie and pretend I lived in California so I did not maintain that. The most expensive medication I have is the Advair asthma inhaler which costs $400 in the US is about $40 here.

Overall my cost of living is maybe 66% lower.

As far as the visa, I was honest when I initially walked across the border that I was planning to stay for an extended time, and they just had me pay $30 for a 180 day tourist visa. Then I actually screwed up and it was expired by a few weeks before I realized so I walked back across the border again and came back and told them I was going to stay for at least a few months more. I was apprehensive when I went to buy the visa again because it seems like they could easily track it via the computer when you give them your passport and purchase it. But the attendant didn't say anything and just gave me another one.

This leads me to believe that hardly anyone in Tijuana cares about the visas for Americans and that the official policy is to just keep giving 6 month tourist visas indefinitely.

If I did not want to pay the $30 every six months anymore then I could just lie when I cross back and say I was just going to party for a few days. It doesn't seem like there is any possibility of anyone besides me looking at the tourist visa while I am here. They only look at it when you cross back over and I rarely receive mail in my San Ysidro box so I rarely need to cross.

Even if you overstay a visa, it's 700 pesos to get a new one inside Mexico (in Guadalajara at least).

I'm the only person I know who leaves the country every six months, and it's mainly because I like to visit my parents at least twice a year and it only costs a $100 ticket for me to see them.

Everyone else discards the visa and pays the 700 pesos (35 USD) when they finally fly out of Mexico.

Never thought I would get to see Playas mentioned in HN. I was born in Tijuana and lived most of my life there. It’s a nice little corner if that’s what you’re looking for.

Once you get away from the hustle and bustle of the border towns, Mexico is the land of sun and flavor. I've got family that live like Kings off thier civil service pension in oceanfront villas just a few short miles south of here. There were scary stories about the narco related violence all over the news a while ago and I'm sure it's still happening but in my experience if you don't go looking for trouble you don't find it. I understand why the locals want to leave for better opportunities. I also understand why the locals on this side of the border head south- for better opportunities. Yes,Mexico has some issues Just like everywhere else But the housing is cheaper and sometimes even better than what you get in southern California. Beer is cheaper (Coronas are about 10$ a case) People are friendlier and really have a honorable culture compared to where I live now. Food prices are basically comparable in the cities with all your favorite brands ( produce is better than USA imho) Most places have less regulation regarding building codes and zoning although I understand this cuts both ways but basically if you get the land( they do 99yr leases instead of ownership unless you are a citizen) If you get the land- you can build to your hearts content. There is a huge population of usa people there already and from countries far and wide and the locals for the most part embrace development . I could go on and on

I love being in Mexico but when the occasional thing happens it's horrifying. In Cabo San Lucas someone in my family has a house and it feels safe and fun to go there. Then two years ago there was a kind of mini drug war and one day there were dead bodies hanging from the freeway overpass [1]. If I was driving by they might just kill me to keep it quiet. That's the terrifying thing, I never worry about that in the US. I have a friend from Mexico, he was a college prof, he refused to give a student a good grade based on a bribe but he didn't know his family was in some kind of gang and one thing lead to another and he decided to immigrate for safety. We never had problems in my family, but we stopped going that year it got dangerous there.

[1] https://www.kcra.com/article/bodies-found-hanging-from-overp...

I'm an American that's been living in Mexico City for 2 years and don't want to ever have to leave. AMA

How do you deal with the air pollution?

That's probably the worst part about living here. And I'm not actually dealing with it very well. It gives me allergy like symptoms so I've been taking an allergy medicine every day. At some point I'm probably gonna get at least one air purifier and put it in my bedroom.

What do you do about the traffic?

Work from home. :)

What do you find most surprising about life in Mexico City vs. wherever you were living before?

My living standards are super high here. Way higher than I thought they would be considering how relatively low my living expenses are compared to where I was living before (Atlanta).

What's crime like compared to a major city in the USA?

This is what I'm most interested in. The picture that the media paints of Mexico City is one of constant violence and crime, I'd love to hear a differing perspective.

US media I see depict Mexico City as safer than the country at large due to less gang influence.

There are a couple of neighborhoods here like Tepito that people say to avoid at all costs. But other than that I don't think it is less safe than any major city anywhere. Mexico City is huge. A lot of people don't realize how big it is.

I've lived in really nice areas of NYC and all over Atlanta. It doesn't feel quite as safe as NYC, But I feel much safer where I live here (near Condesa) than I did when I lived in Castleberry Hill (Atlanta), where I was robbed at gunpoint and had things stolen from my building garage. Worst that has happened to me here is my bike was stolen outside a movie theater. Ironically I walked into the theater that night wondering if my bike would still be there when I got out, and indeed my instinct was right. If I had parked it inside the garage of the mall it would have been fine. That was when I first moved here.

It seems to be very much as they say, as long as you don't go looking for trouble it won't find you.

That said I have had to pay a couple of bribes to cops and I certainly never want to own a car here. One time I got caught turning into a bus lane. It was quite innocent I was just following the car in front of me and didn't know where I was going. The other I pretty much got shook down cause I was with a friend whose car has deep tints (which are illegal in the state we were driving thru).

Centuries after independence, seems like the former colonies keep mirroring the relationship of their former colonizers - Spanish-speakers going north to work, English-speakers going south to retire.

Except the colonizers of Mexico were Spanish. They definitely did not speak English

I think he is referring to the English going to Spain to retire and the Spanish going to London for work mirrors Americans going to Mexico to retire, and Mexicans coming to America for work opportunities.

Yes, exactly.

I’m sorry, call me paranoid or easily duped by bad press, but there is just no way. I understand that you can get more got your money there, but I’ll take my chances here. America needs work, don’t get me wrong, but no thanks.

Eh, lots of Europeans would say the same about moving to the US!

Sure and vice versa for us about Europe. Either way Mexico is much more worse off than the other two entities.

I respect that. We all have our tolerances.

Yeah I mean the amount of homicides just related to drug cartels in Mexico is approximately the same humber of total homicides in the US. This, despite Mexico having a bit more than 1/3 of the US population. Not to mention the issues with the economy.

http://archive.is/qb2GJ

How much would you need per month to live very comfy? In a beachside place?

"comfy" varies so much between people that the question cannot be answered.

I lived in a tiny unit on a beach in Oaxaca for $60/mo. And I consider walking out the front door of an apartment onto a beach more comfy than anywhere I have lived so far in the States for $1000+/mo.

Meanwhile, I know people who aren't willing to give up even the smallest trappings of familiarity, and they can only endure in a Hilton in a tourist city that doesn't even seem like Mexico.

What I wood need; good condition house or unit with 2 bed room, fast internet, safe area, no shortage of good food, beach

Safe for kids too

Depending upon how you define " very comfy" You can lease beachfront property for much less than a thousand per month and that is for a mansion Including domestic help. I will say that if you need medical care above what a clinic can provide you are better off in the states . However dental is awesome here and I've heard a few us plans cover dental in Mexican clinics. Internet is available as well as data plans that are cheaper than the states depending on where you are. Utilities are so much cheaper and if you need to go to the pharmacy for meds there is NO cheaper place to get the same meds. Yes you pay cash but it's like 1/10th the price. Yes it's label is not printed in English but it's the same compound. The Mexican government cares for and protects it's fisheries in ways the USA never did so the seafood there is much much higher quality. We get shrimp, live off the fisherman's boat for 10 bucks a kilo!!! Yes there still is some issues regarding the drinking water ( in some places) but the hn crowd probably is used to drinking out of bottles instead of a tap. There are some places the water is better quality than the usa- I'm funny about water quality and I drink the water there in some places and others I won't. There is still a huge divide between the haves and have nots . The people I know there are honorable. One thing you may have to realize is that if you cross an international border the US Constitution does not apply- lots of ppl forget this. Weed and other drugs are not yet legal and while can be overlooked for$$ If you go looking for trouble, you will find it.

> “Despite the fact that Donald Trump insults my country every day, here we receive the entire international community, beginning with Americans, with open arms and hearts,” Villareal said. [..] Unlike the United States, Mexico hasn’t traditionally had many immigrants. Less than 1 percent of the population is foreign-born.

13.7% in the US are foreign-born - making US arms more than ten times as open to the international community as Mexico's. It's easy to be welcoming to foreigners when their numbers are a rounding error compared to the total population.

13.7% might be foreign born but immigrants are crucial to our economy, they stimulate the economy by their spending and we'd have negative population growth without them. Even undocumented or illegal immigrants are a net positive economically. Many many industries would be devastated without their foreign workers, including agriculture and restaurants, among many other areas.

Illegal aliens are a net loss of around $113b cost to the taxpayers. More than they bring in and it's just a little more than I want to spend. If California complains about having $1b funding pulled for their rail project imagine having 113b pulled. At least be honest that you don't know what you're talking about.

https://www.fairus.org/issue/publications-resources/fiscal-b...

I don't think it's fair to distill everything down to good if it grows the economy, bad if it doesn't. For example, we keep hearing how oppressed minorities are, but in the last ~35 years, a single generation, California went from 66% to 37% white - is a 2% higher annual GDP growth worth becoming a minority for?

I live in California, we are not doing as great as everyone thinks we are. We have homeless, shit in the streets, stupid high rent, extra traffic, high taxes, etc.

As great as it is to live here I think the state is actually going downhill over time.

I also don't care what it does, if an illegal alien takes from the tax payer that money could be spent on, oh I don't know, healthcare, homeless, VA, or any other humanitarian purpose. I can walk outside and see a couple tents, I drive to work I see dozens, I drive further and I see tent cities. Let's take care of our own citizens first for once? Why not improve their home countries instead of everyone coming here?

I live in Seattle and there are similar problems. The homeless are all us citizens. They don't have problems caused by immigration. I talk to these sad souls frequently. Every day unfortunately I walk past them on the way to work. I say unfortunate because I want them to have a place to live and not be on the street.

They have nothing to do with illegal immigrants. These homeless people aren't going to be working in a restaurant or other kinds of jobs immigrants often do. In seattle the minimum wage is $15 an hour, that is not enough to attract the homeless here.

You're dense, I said rather than spending $113b on the illegal aliens how about we spend even if it's a fraction of "one hundred thirteen billion" on the homeless problem. If they're all US citizens then you should feel empathetic to help them more.

That is a drastically higher estimate than the cost of illegal immigration I have seen other places. Indeed I have seen in other reports that illegal immigration is a net economic positive. This cato report says that report is fatally flawed [1]. Among other things the outlandish figure of 113b is easily corrected to 3-15b. And this article strongly suggests its a net positive in reality. See also [2], [3].

So you need an estimate that passes the laugh test.

1. https://www.cato.org/blog/fairs-fiscal-burden-illegal-immigr... 2. https://www.apnews.com/1e597a4896884da08bef0a8f8134c6be 3. https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-federation-for-american-i...

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